Board of Health,

I write as a former Labor and Delivery Nurse of 25 years. Abortion clinics should be required to comply with all the regulations and standards of any other outpatient surgical unit. Why" Simple. Abortion is surgery, and surgery knows no politics. Germs dont know that the VDH has given the abortion clinic a certain span of time to come into compliance with state regulations. Germs are opportunists. If you have a poorly sanitized facility, or a lax "surgical conscience," or contaminated surgical instruments, GERMS WILL INVADE. Its their nature. If a womans body retains the placenta because her hormones didnt get the memo that he baby was being surgically removed today, she WILL bleed. If her hemorrhaging cannot be stopped, the body doesnt know that there were no two units of packed RBCs typed and cross-matched prior to surgery, or that they are only available through that narrow hall and across town, or that the doctor doesnt have admitting privileges at that hospital. THE BODY JUST BLEEDS. There are some facts about surgery that simply dont admit of compromise. Microbiology, anatomy and physiology, and physics dont bargain. Nature obeys its own laws, whether we like it or not. My question is this: Why should we NOT apply, and enforce, all the safety standards and best practice regulations levied on every other in-patient or out-patient surgical unit" Whom are we trying to kid" Each of these regulations were formulated through research, trial-and-error, and, (as the Risk Management people tell us,) LAWSUITS. In the end, have we ever really banished "Back-Alley" abortions, or just given them a new coat of paint" Rosemary Antunes, RN